


The Shape of Us

by houdini74



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: But just what's in canon, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Fluff and Angst, Inanimate Objects, M/M, Sort Of, anthropomorphic buildings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-13
Updated: 2020-11-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:42:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27546280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/houdini74/pseuds/houdini74
Summary: Rose Apothecary loves David Rose. This is their love story. Oh, and Patrick's in it too.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Patrick Brewer/David Rose/Rose Apothecary
Comments: 70
Kudos: 143





	The Shape of Us

**Author's Note:**

> I started writing this ages ago and for awhile I never thought I'd finish it. But here it is, the first-person story from the Rose Apothecary's POV that no one asked for.

_We shape our buildings; thereafter they shape us._ -Winston Churchill

💙🏠🖤

Was it the corner store that came first? 

No. 

No, I don’t think so. 

My mind, such as it is, is cloudy. Nonetheless, I have the vaguest impression that there was something earlier, something older, something before I became myself. You’ll have to forgive me, when you’re more than a hundred years old, you tend to lose track of the details. But people talked of a hardware store. Before. But the corner store is what I remember most clearly. 

The town was different then, the way I remember it, the streets filled with children and cars piled with tourists stopped every summer, their sticky hands caressing my door handles and leaving streaks on my windows. 

I’m not doing a good job of this. Instead of complaining about sticky fingers, I should be talking about the way the sun would shine through my windows in the afternoon, making my front room feel warm and inviting. Or the way people would gather, catching up on the latest news, leaning on the counter.

Carol and Burt, my owners at the time, served ice cream and sodas from a counter at the back and sold penny candy in small brown paper bags. And Carol was quick to wipe the stickiness from my door handles until the brass shone in the sun. The days passed quickly, each one bringing something new, the months and weeks piling on top of each other without my noticing. Carol and Burt grew old within my walls, their daughters growing from babies to adulthood. Back then, I thought it would last forever. I never dreamed they would ever leave me behind. I thought they would always be there, that the three of us would be together forever. I was wrong.

It was spring when they said goodbye to me. The lilacs were in bloom in the park across the street, the heady scent drifting over to me, making me think of warm days filled with ice cream and children’s laughter. Little did I know that those days had passed me by, never to return. Slowly, my shelves grew empty as people filled their shopping baskets with 50% off sales, the last few bags of flour and boxes of soap leaning together until they too disappeared. All that was left was for Carol to give my chipped front door a final pat before she turned the key in my lock one last time. Burt’s shoulders were hunched and bent, Carol’s sable hair was silver as they walked away from me that day. And even though I searched every face that came through my doors, I never saw them again. They had gone, leaving me behind.

After Burt and Carol left, my thoughts inwards, barely able to summon the energy to notice the people on the street as they walked by, always hurrying to somewhere else. Why should I care about them when no one cared about me? I was alone; I would never have another owner who loved me like they did. 

The years that followed are fuzzy, I drifted in and out of awareness, through the souvenir shop that painted my facade an unappealing baby blue to the pet store with the puppies who whined at night with no one to comfort them. None of them cared the way my beloved Burt and Carol had cared. And none of them stayed. Any faint hopes I had were quickly abandoned. In between were the months and years of emptiness, when nothing filled my walls and no one came to visit me. So I ignored them all. 

When the drug store came, I started to hope again. 

The town wasn’t what it used to be. Even I could see it. Unfilled potholes grew in the streets and all of our storefronts were in need of a good coat of paint. But people still loved us. Loved me and my friends across the road. The locals filled our aisles, spending what they could, but it wasn’t enough to hold us all. The bakery closed first and then the bookstore and until slowly, surely, only three of us remained. 

After the drug store closed I stood empty and alone. Those were sleepy days. No one visited me except for Ray, stopping in on his monthly visits to check my roof and plumbing for leaks. I knew no one could ever love me like Carol and Burt had, but still I basked in the sun and tried to look my best in hopes that someone would see something special in me.

Sitting empty was hard. The wind howled, relentless, making my bones creak and my windows rattle. The rain ran in rivulets through my gutters and snow piled up, melting to unforgiving ice. And through it all there was no one to care for me. No one to love me like I deserved.

💙🏠🖤

I know I’m the nicest building in town. Everyone says so. Even though my doors are closed and shuttered, people still take my photograph. So why won’t anyone love me? I’m pretty and welcoming, my hardwood gleams and my subway tile walls are back in style. And yet I’m all alone. Empty. 

Months pass. 

Spring.

Summer. 

Autumn. 

Ray comes faithfully, checking me off on his clipboard. He chatters at me happily but I’m just another task for him, he doesn’t think I’m special. Then one day, Ray has someone with him. My doors are flung open and boxes begin to fill up my space. At last! Someone sees something in me. My rooms will once again be filled with people and I’ll feel the heartbeat of the town, no matter how faintly it beats. But my hopes are dashed as soon as I see the industrial shelving, products strewn haphazardly with no rhyme or reason. I can already tell that it isn’t to be. Almost before it opens, the general store is closed again. Cindy turns her key in the lock one final time and once again I stand empty. 

Cars pass on the street outside much less frequently than they have in the years before and my hopes of finding an owner who will love and care for me fade away. I know I deserve someone who can create something whimsical, who will appreciate my hardwood floors and pressed tin ceiling. Someone with a keen eye and good taste. Someone who is a stranger to this town. 

One day. One day someone will come and bring my walls back to life.

One day.

💙🏠🖤

There’s a man.

There’s a man in my front room and he’s wearing a black and white striped sweater. The man says his name is Patrick. Or is it David? I’m not sure. It doesn’t matter. 

The man sits for a very long time on the chair that he found in my backroom. It’s an old chair, one of the originals from a set that Carol and Burt had when they’d sit in the back and eat lunch at the wooden table where their girls would do their homework and Carol would do the bookkeeping by hand. The table and the rest of the chairs have been gone for years, but this one chair hangs on, used and abused by each of my owners. 

Pulling out a pen, the man writes onto a form before he scowls and crosses out the words, trying again. With a sign of frustration, he puts down the pen. The paper is more scratches than letters now and he looks at it in frustration before folding it up and putting it back in his pocket. He tilts his head back and stares at the ceiling, before he stands up and turns in a slow circle to take in the room. “I can do this.” The words bounce off my empty walls and echo back at him.

 _You can do this. I know you can._ I want to reassure him, to tell him that we can be successful together, this striking dark-haired man and I. Together, we can do great things. Beautiful things. I can feel it.

Just inside the door, the man pauses, his hand on the latch. “I’ll be back.” I can hear the determination in his voice as his hand brushes over the chipped paint of my front door.

The furniture arrives a week later. He surprises me, this man, who I now know is called David. Instead of chrome and glass and metal, he’s chosen dark antique shelves and worn wooden tables. The pieces fit like they were made to be inside my walls. They feel right. They feel like David understands me.

The cardboard boxes are next. Big and small, filled with jars and bottles and scarves. Each one unpacked, the contents filling up my new shelves, making my space feel alive again. David is here all the time now, working into the evening, unpacking and organizing. I can see how much he cares for his store, how much he’s starting to care for me as he runs his hand along my counter or up the side of my doorway. But I can see his worry as well. Often in the evening he sits alone in the back room, sorting invoices into piles and checking off items on a list that always seems to get longer and never shorter. 

I long to cheer him on. To let him know that I’m here for him, that I believe in him. To reassure him that I’m the perfect place for his business with its sand and stone color palette and its handmade products. But David just frowns at the accounting software on the laptop in my backroom, slamming down the lid so quickly he almost catches his fingers.

💙🏠🖤

“Oh, I’m gonna get the money.”

This new man, who’s name really is Patrick, is confident, almost cocky, but I can sense some uncertainty in him. Is he really what David needs? He teases David so easily, and at a time when David’s attention needs to be focused on launching his business. I can see the smile that flickers on David’s lips when he watches him and the way his eyes follow Patrick around the store when he thinks the other man isn’t looking. David had looked at me like that when he’d first moved in, as though I was something special. But now he only stares at Patrick.

Now is not the time for distractions. And yet, more often than not, it is Patrick who sits in the desk at the back room, tidying the invoices into neat folders as he enters them into the computer, ruthlessly crossing things off the list that slowly but surely gets shorter and shorter. Patrick might make David’s business successful. Patrick might take David away from me. 

He’s there now, checking invoices against the inventory sheet he’s created, muttering under his breath as he flips back and forth, red rubber thimbles on the fingers of his left hand.

“David?” Patrick flips the papers back and forth, a frown creasing his forehead. “Can you phone Andre at the vineyard? Their shipment was short by a couple of bottles.”

“Um…” David appears in the doorway, his hands twisting together. “It wasn’t short, exactly.” I shift uneasily on my foundation, making the ceiling joists creak. Patrick is steady where David is mercurial, but I don’t like his implied criticism of David. “I gave them to Stevie for helping the other day.”

“David. You can’t just give stuff away.” Patrick’s voice is serious. Too serious. As though he has any right to call David to account when it’s David who has made me beautiful again. 

“Well, we didn’t have any money to pay her, we’re not open yet!”

“When you give things away, it messes up my whole system.” Patrick crosses his arms and stares at David, who glares back at him defiantly. This is it. Patrick is going to quit and David won’t be able to manage by himself. Or David will force Patrick to leave and the store will close before it opens. And I’ll be all alone, yet again. My joists creak again, more loudly this time. “Besides, giving things away runs counter to the purpose of our store.”

“Cultivating a beautiful aesthetic?” A smile dances at the corners of David’s mouth.

“Making a profit.” Patrick counters as he comes around the desk to stand in front of David. “ Tell you what. If you remember to leave me a note about what you give away, I won’t get on your case about it. Mostly.” Patrick smirks at David, who rolls his eyes in response. “I’ll start by deducting the wine from your pay.”

David huffs at him and for a second I’m angry that Patrick dares to be this way with David until I see the smile flickering on David’s lips. 

Slowly, we find an easy rhythm, the three of us. David and Patrick tease each other mercilessly and even someone as unfamiliar with human emotion as myself can see something building between them. It makes me uneasy, this place they are headed to, the long glances and the flirty conversations. It could so easily go wrong, tearing apart everything they’ve built, adding one more failure to my roster of failed businesses. 

But there’s nothing I can do about it. Nothing except watch and wait.

💙🏠🖤

David’s store opens tomorrow. My shelves are full, products carefully arranged by David’s precise hands. It’s late, almost midnight. David went home some time ago, but Patrick is still here, watching something on his phone, a screwdriver in one hand. After a long moment, he sets both items on the counter and goes into the back for a ladder. The lights in the back room go out as Patrick flips the breaker.

_...connect the two ground wires together..._

The voice on the video is small and tinny. Atop the ladder, Patrick fumbles with the wires, swearing under his breath as he tries to follow the instructions.

_...connect the white neutral wires…_

Patrick swears again. “There isn’t a white wire.”

_...the color of the neutral wires may vary…_

“Yeah, I figured that out. Thanks.”

_...connect the black live wires…_

A handful of muttered curses later and Patrick reattaches the light to the wall. He moves the ladder to the other side of the doorway. The second light goes faster than the first and he flips the breaker back on, laughing out loud as the lights come on. 

The next day I can tell David is nervous. He buzzes around the store, straightening perfectly straight products.

“Maybe the soap should be closer to the door?”

“We’re not moving the soap.” Patrick looks up from where he’s programming some last minute items into the point of sale system. 

“But what if people want soap and they have to come all the way to the back of the store to find it?”

“Then maybe they’ll buy something else to go with the soap.”

“Okay, but—” 

“David. We can’t have all the items at the front of the store. You chose specific items for a reason. If none of them sell, we can reassess later.”

“Oh my god, do you think nothing is going to sell?”

“David—” Patrick looks like he’s trying not to laugh. “It’s going to be fine. Look, people are already lining up.” 

“Lining up?!”

Despite David’s worries, the opening goes off without a hitch. People pack my front room once again, their voices filling the space with happy chatter as they selected hand creams and cutting boards and locally made cheese to take home with them. 

I can’t remember the last time I felt this complete, this hopeful about the future. It’s been years since so many people visited me at one time. David and Patrick make a great team, the perfect professional blend. Lost in thought, I suddenly realize that the two of them have been hugging for ages, locked in an embrace that they both seem reluctant to break.

No. Oh no. No. This can’t happen. How dare Patrick try to come between us? David has to stay focused on the store. On me. This is no time for romance. I have to do something. I shift on my foundation, making the windows rattle ominously, but neither of them notice. The lights. I make them flicker, softly at first and then more dramatically. Finally, they break apart, frowning in consternation at my diversion.

Ah. That’s better. My sigh makes the building settle. Patrick busies himself tidying up the dirty wine glasses from the opening. The tips of his ears are a faint pink color. Patrick has said it himself, he’s just the numbers guy. If anyone is expendable in this relationship, it isn’t David or myself. I vow to watch him carefully to make sure he doesn’t overstep.

For the next two weeks I’m on my guard, watching for any sign that something unprofessional is developing between David and Patrick but things are the same as they’ve always been. Patrick teases David and David pretends to be annoyed. Occasionally, I catch Patrick staring at David when he thinks David isn’t looking, but otherwise their attention is focused on the business, where it should be. 

Everything is fine until David’s birthday. Patrick catches both David and I off guard and before I can do anything, he’s asked David out for dinner. Why does he need to ruin things? Everything is perfect just the way it is. There’s no need to bring something messy like love into the equation. But while Patrick is helping a customer, David goes into the back room to invite his friend Stevie to join them for dinner. Maybe I’m overreacting. Maybe this isn’t a date after all. I sigh, settling on my foundations. Just friends celebrating David’s birthday. Just the way it should be.

💙🏠🖤

He’s tricked me. 

Patrick has tricked me. 

I can tell something is different as soon as he arrives for work. It’s six in the morning and he’s humming to himself, an uncontainable smile creeping out over his face before being reeled back in again. By the time David arrives at ten o’clock, Patrick has swept the floors (twice) and washed the windows and done something to the computer system that made him exclaim happily to himself. 

Patrick’s whole body goes still when David arrives, that smile spreading out over his face again. And then, David kisses him. It’s just a peck on the cheek, but I know something has happened to change things between them _between us_ forever. 

David has chosen Patrick instead of me. I’ve never felt more alone. If it all goes wrong, David will leave me and I’ll be empty, just like before. Sullenly, I watch as they kiss right in front of me. 

They’re kissing. Again. Ever since that first kiss on the cheek it’s all they do. I was right to be worried, twice now, a customer has almost caught them, making Patrick’s ears turn pink and David stutter excuses. And now David has Patrick pinned against the stockroom wall. If I didn’t know any better, I would worry for Patrick’s safety, it’s unclear how he’s managing to breathe in that position. But I’ve learned a lot over the past few weeks and the noises Patrick makes might sound like he’s in distress, but that’s very much not the case.

The kissing, along with other things that I can’t even bring myself to describe, has gone on for months now. Patrick makes David smile the way no one else can. But still, I worry. As I’ve learned all too well, nothing lasts forever.

💙🏠🖤

And then one day, disaster. Patrick shows up alone. But even more alarming, he’s late, dark circles ring his eyes as he sits behind the counter, staring listlessly into space. I wait and wait for David but he never comes. Instead, the day ends with Patrick, sobbing and alone in the backroom.

Patrick cries as though his heart is broken. And maybe it is, there’s still no sign of David. Eventually, Patrick’s sobs give way to whimpers and he curls up on the couch, pulling a blanket over top of himself as he drifts off to sleep. I want to chastise him, to blame him from keeping David away from me but I feel like I understand him now. He loves David too, even if he hasn’t admitted it to himself, just the same way that I do. What will either of us do if David is gone forever?

The next day passes in much the same fashion as the first. And the next. And the next. Patrick greets each morning with a grim determination that leaves him in tears by the end of the day. Some nights he heads home, shoulders slumping as he turns off the lights and locks my door and other nights he collapses on the couch, too exhausted to move. I wish I could comfort him but all I can do is make these little noises that provide no comfort at all. 

“I don’t want to leave. David, don’t make me leave.” Patrick tosses in his sleep, muttering to himself. 

I can’t bear it. All these months, I feared that David might leave me but now I know that losing Patrick would be just as bad. And there’s nothing I can do.

Patrick is so pale in the morning that he almost glows in the dim light of the back room. Over his shoulder, I see him searching on the internet for jobs in Toronto. Why would Patrick need a job in Toronto? 

Oh. 

No. No, Patrick can’t be allowed to leave. I’ve already lost David, I can’t lose them both. I should never have thought all those bad things about Patrick and tried to drive him away. If he leaves now, I’ll be all alone. There must be some other way. If only David would come back to us. Surely then things will go back to the way they were.

💙🏠🖤

Oh, I want to shake David! How could he be so thoughtlessly cruel to me? And to Patrick? I could just cry!

But David’s back. He hasn’t forgotten us or made plans to leave me behind. And I can tell from the way his hand caresses my door handle and the soft wood of the front counter that he’s missed me as much as I’ve missed him. He’s treated us terribly but I can’t help but forgive him. He’s here now and that’s all that matters. 

And Patrick is smiling. For the first time in a week the warmth has returned to his eyes. For the first time in a week I know he won’t sleep on the couch in the back room. And David is smiling too, even as Patrick scolds him, their smiles warm me up inside. Both David and Patrick are here together and everything is the way it should be.

The music is very loud. Surely people will hear it on the street and they will notice the way David is dancing for Patrick. David would be so embarrassed if he thought someone could see him. I hear the whispers as people walk by and Roland breaks into applause as David hurls himself onto the floor at Patrick’s feet.

I groan, certain David must be injured if he’s down on the ground. Sitting on the floor is, as David would say, incorrect. But David is laughing and Patrick too as he reaches to pull David into his arms and they’re kissing again just like before David went away.

It seems the week apart hasn’t lessened their desire for kissing. I try to dissuade them, but the lights are already off and there’s nothing I can do. Laughing, David pulls Patrick into the back room, their bodies moving as one as they navigate the darkened space by memory. And oh. Oh, I was wrong about the couch. Patrick is making good use of it tonight. Even in the darkness, I have to look away before I embarrass myself.

In the morning, David and Patrick arrive together, their hands reach for each other constantly, as though they can’t bear to be apart. But they reach for me as well, straightening products on my shelves, cleaning my floors, polishing my counter, just the way I’ve always wanted. Just the way it should be. 

I’ve stood on this corner in this town for a long time. People have come and gone, some have loved me and some have left me. But none of them have loved me, or loved each other, the way that Patrick and I love David. Or the way he loves us back.

💙🏠🖤


End file.
